I'm not. You were able to read open source code and learn from it, taking advantage of a lot of effort its authors put into it (who knows, maybe you even stumbled on some of my work out there?). You had access to computers and to the Internet, and had time to use it, most likely thanks to your parents, which isn't a given. You admitted yourself that you turned into publicly funded military for it to invest into your education. You also had ability to do side projects while working a low paying job, instead of, say, taking care of an ill relative your whole spare time - not everyone is so lucky. And perhaps most importantly of it all, you turned your attention into software engineering during time when software engineering is extremely lucrative - it doesn't have to stay this way at all.

I don't even have a degree, by the way; I'm mostly self-taught too.

> You were able to read open source code and learn from it, taking advantage of a lot of effort its authors put into it (who knows, maybe you even stumbled on some of my work out there?).

I knew you were going to fixate on that, as you’re grasping at straws, which is why I put it in there. The amount of source code I read was one project, a php web framework. Yea I learned about 2 things from it back then, which I’ve long forgotten now.

Since I didn’t earn what I have, call your school, revoke your degree, quit your job and start over again with only unskilled jobs on your resume. Until you do that you won’t understand.

> Until you do that you won’t understand.

I already said that I don't even have a degree. All you did in this thread was proving the point of my original comment.

No, I haven’t. You are assuming people give out info for free. What you’re saying is essentially that your degree was free. Someone had to pay for it. For me it was buying books. Did those authors help me with free books? No they charged me just the same. How is this getting help from others? Unless you believe that if you gain knowledge at all even with compensation from someone else is help. But that’s just commerce.

> You are assuming people give out info for free.

They do. I learned a lot thanks to them.

> What you’re saying is essentially that your degree was free.

My degree that does not exist?

> They do. I learned a lot thanks to them.

Since you’re still not following, why do people post blog articles? Why do people write research papers? Just to get the info out there? No, they do it because it gives them some advantage over others. FAANGs won’t hire you without proof of knowledge. The other side of it is SEO. You want to exist on google you have to look like an expert, so you write a lot of articles to increase your score. Both of these situations are driven by money, not by some desire to help others.

> My degree that does not exist?

Fine, then you’re essentially saying that all the learning you did was free for you. It required no effort at all, all you had to do was read. If your self taught, or went to school, you know this is just dumb.

So back to the point, did you or did you not work for the knowledge you have? Or did it just get matrixed into you?

> Both of these situations are driven by money, not by some desire to help others.

I've learned a lot from pseudonymous or even anonymous people with no money or fame involved. And helped others this way too.

> Fine, then you’re essentially saying that all the learning you did was free for you. It required no effort at all, all you had to do was read.

That's not what I'm saying at all and you would have known that if you would read what I wrote with comprehension. It took a lot of effort, but I recognize that this effort alone is just a single factor that influenced what I earn, and not even the most important one. Other factors outside of my control could have easily ruined (or boosted) it all, and it's true for everyone.